Bones
by carved in the sand
Summary: These bones bones, so weak and frail, they rattle, fracture, splinter so easily. The marrow tears itself apart. But they do not break. And neither does she - sakura-centric


Sakura is thirteen, and rattling from the inside out.

Sasuke screams in agony atop the tree branch like his insides are melting, and she can faintly see the smoke rising from his neck like it's slow roasting. She wants to scream too, scream and cry and let the tears fall onto the dirty grass. Her skull is whirling on the inside with images of Orochimaru ripping off his face, his swirling neck that reached out to brand Sasuke.

Sakura rattles, bones trembling, and when the dark haired boy latches onto her hand like she's the only thing anchoring his soul to his body, her eyes burn.

The tears spill over her lids as she pulls him into her arms, trying to keep her ribs from collapsing in on her heart.

She is still rattling, harder, precariously, when he is leaving.

Her shoulder blades become too weak to hold up the weight of his pain, and as she collapses, she does so loudly and passionately and screaming out her love with a suffocating heart, spilling red everywhere.

Sasuke places her rubble onto a lone bench, leaving behind the stench of heartache.

.

.

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Sakura is fourteen, fracturing, as she is putting herself back together.

Tsunade brings her away from her office, out into the training grounds, and bruises her flesh relentlessly, spoiling the blood beneath her skin into red and purple against the expanse of too-pale skin. Sakura attempts to defend, to attack, to keep from being turned to dust amidst the onslaught, yet when she pushes chakra through her arm, every bit of strength she owns inside of her, she feels it the bones fracturing, unable to take the force.

Weak. From the very core, she is weak.

Screaming murder, Sakura lets herself crack inside as she lands her first direct hit to her teacher's stomach.

Wide-eyed, Tsunade flies into a tree.

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.

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Sakura is fifteen when she feels the fissures in her very marrow tearing her apart.

It is the moment she's sworn herself to own, to take back the shell of the boy she once knew, and rip this imposter's soul away from his body because he is not Sasuke. It is the moment she pays his debt. The tip of her kunai glimmers a faint shade of purple a few centimeters from his back that will shut down his intestines and infect his bloodstream and let him rot.

It is the moment that lasts her ten thousand life time.

Her fingers begin to splinter from the strength she holds them with, and yet she holds them tighter, the phalanges cracking a thousand different pieces.

The kunai goes slack in her grasp as he turns around, madly lunging for her throat.

And it is when she knew she could not.

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.

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Sakura is sixteen when she fights in her first war, learning not to be broken.

Strapping on her flak jacket in the mirror, Sakura's brows stitch in frustration, fists clenching sporadically, making the whole process that much difficult. There is a lot of snatching and rushing and scratching against the back of her hands. She is ready to burst with anger.

She meets her own eyes in the mirror, the bottlecap green glinting with steel.

"You won't fall apart," she grunts.

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.

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Sakura is seventeen and mending.

Her spine hold strong, lifting her chin to the sky and her eyes into space, keeping everything together. She has learned how to not be broken any more, reinforcing her skeleton with titatium and love. They bear scars telling stories of pain that her flesh cannot comprehend.

Her hair sways in the breeze as she steps out from the hospital and into the night. S

She spots a murky figure in the distance, and smiles.

"Sasuke," she calls out. "Why aren't you at Ichakiru's yet?"

"I'm late," Sasuke says, stepping forward into a pool of light. His eyes, pools of ink, are warm tonight. "So I was hoping you would be too."

Her grin was bright. Naruto and Sai couldn't start eating without them, regardless. "Of course I am. And it looks like we're going to have to walk extra slow, then."

He rolled his eyes, not quite holding back a smirk, and motioned her into the dark. Sakura skipped out beside him and they made their way lazily into the streets of Konoha.


End file.
